That's not Jesse James - tests or no tests

DALLAS (AP) - Forensic experts looking for the remains of Jesse James didn't need DNA evidence to tell they had the wrong man: the missing arm was a dead giveaway.

A misplaced headstone in a Granbury cemetery fooled researchers who were looking for the remains of the notorious outlaw, Southwest Texas State University forensic anthropologist David Glassman said Friday.

Instead of exhuming the skeleton of J. Frank Dalton, who claimed until his death in 1951 to be Jesse James, researchers unearthed the body of a one-armed man, Henry Holland, who died in 1927.

Attention now has focused on an adjacent coffin partially exposed during the exhumation, Glassman said.

Bud Hardcastle, a Purcell, Okla., car dealer who has spent $10,000 of his own money attempting to prove the Dalton-James connection through DNA testing said researchers suspected they had made a mistake soon after they found the corpse had only one arm.

Dalton is known to have both arms intact at the time of his death, Hardcastle said. The fact that the coffin was made of steel, instead of wood as cemetery records indicated, was another a clue.

"It's back to square one," a disappointed Hardcastle said. "But it is certainly something we started and intend to finish. It's another hurdle. And I'm a hurdler.

"If we thought there was somebody else in that spot, we wouldn't do this," he added.

Now, researchers are awaiting another court order to exhume the second coffin. Hardcastle has vowed to pursue a second order.

Although the mistake was apparent shortly after the coffin was exhumed May 30, researchers waited to notify Holland's family before announcing the error, Glassman said.

Historical accounts say James was shot in the back of the head by Bob Ford, a member of his own gang, on April 3, 1882, in St. Joseph, Mo.

But some Granbury residents say the outlaw survived, assumed the name of J. Frank Dalton and moved to the town 25 miles southwest of Fort Worth. They claim he lived to be 104 and was buried in 1951 under the gravestone that reads "Jesse Woodson James," which includes the inscription, "Supposedly killed in 1882."

In late May, cemetery crewman moved aside the hefty headstone and the grave vault was taken to an undisclosed site where skeletal remains were removed to compare DNA material against a known descendant of James.